In the first case of Ebola to be diagnosed in the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed today through laboratory tests that a person who had traveled to Dallas from Liberia was hospitalized Sept. 28 for testing for Ebola at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas.
Local public health officials have begun identifying close contacts of the person for further daily monitoring for 21… read more
Neurons programmed to fire at specific faces may have more affect on conscious recognition of faces than the images themselves, neuroscientists have found.
Subjects presented with a blended face, such as an amalgamation of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, had significantly more firing of such face-specific neurons when they recognized the blended or morphed face as one person or the other.
Results of the study led by… read more
An online demo puts you in the middle of a Google Street View with four directional options and challenges you to navigate to the nearest McDonald’s in the fewest possible steps.
While humans are generally better at this specific task than the algorithm, researchers at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) found that a new algorithm consistently outperformed humans at a variation of the task in which… read more
Astronomers have detected radio waves within a giant gas cloud in interstellar space corresponding to an unusual carbon-based molecule called isopropyl cyanide, needed for life, as described in the journal Science (Sept. 26.)
Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, a group of radio telescopes known as the ALMA Observatory, researchers studied the gaseous star-forming region Sagittarius B2, located 27,000 light years away from Earth.
Organic molecules usually… read more
University of Rochester scientists have developed a cloaking (as in Harry Potter) method that uses four standard lenses that keeps the object hidden as the viewer moves up to several degrees away from the optimal viewing position.
Previous cloaking devices have used “high-tech or exotic materials,” said John Howell, a professor of physics at the University of Rochester.
“This is the first device that we know of that… read more
As LG demonstrated this summer with its new 18-inch partially flexible curved screen, the next generation of roll-up displays may be tantalizingly close.
Now UCLA and Yonsei University researchers have taken the next step, with an inexpensive, simple new way to make transparent, flexible transistors that could help bring roll-up smartphones with see-through displays and other bendable gadgets to consumers in just a few years, as they reported… read more
Scientists from the University of Southampton plan to turn the Moon into a giant particle detector to help understand the origin of ultra-high-energy (UHE) cosmic rays — the most energetic particles in the Universe.
The origin of UHE cosmic rays is one of the great mysteries in astrophysics. Nobody knows where these extremely rare cosmic rays come from or how they get their enormous energies. Physicists detect them on… read more
European project E2SWITCH is developing new electronic systems with ultra-low energy consumption, based on tunnel FET (TFET) heterostructures for switches (transistors) and circuits.
The idea is to design that will be built on silicon substrates but designed to operate at voltages that are up to five times lower than those used in mobile phones, while reducing thermal dissipation.
Transistors and circuits based on lower voltages result… read more
The FDA has approved an investigational new drug application for Tumor Paint BLZ-100, a protein-linked dye that highlights cancer cells in images so surgeons can precisely target brain tumors.
The FDA move means Blaze Bioscience can proceed with a clinical trial in Los Angeles, Queensland, Australia and other sites.
Twenty-one adult patients who need surgery for often-deadly glioma brain tumors are expected to enroll in the study, which… read more
The U.S. Department of Energy national laboratories are teaming up with academia and the private sector to develop what they call the most advanced climate and Earth system computer model yet, and investigate key fundamental science questions, such as the interaction of clouds and climate and the role of secondary organic aerosols.
The project could help address concerns by some that the 55 existing global climate models… read more
Michigan Technological University engineers have developed a tabletop model of a robot team that can bring power to emergency workers, starting with cell towers to restore communications.
“If we can regain power in communication towers, then we can find the people we need to rescue,” says Nina Mahmoudian, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering–engineering mechanics. “And the human rescuers can communicate with each other.”
The team has programmed… read more
Purdue University researchers are developing a robotic fabric that moves and contracts and is embedded with sensors, an approach that could bring “active clothing” and a new class of soft robots.
Such an elastic technology could make possible robots that have sensory skin, stretchable robotic garments that people might wear for added strength and endurance, “g-suits” for pilots or astronauts to counteract the effects of acceleration, and… read more
Purdue University researchers have developed a chip capable of simulating a tumor’s “microenvironment” to test the effectiveness of nanoparticles and drugs that target cancer.
The new tumor-microenvironment-on-chip (T-MOC) will allow researchers to study the complex environment surrounding tumors and the barriers that prevent targeted delivery of therapeutic agents, said Bumsoo Han, a Purdue associate professor of mechanical engineering.
Researchers are trying to perfect “targeted… read more
Replacing silicon, new ultra-fast “phase-change materials” (PCMs) that could eventually enable processing speeds 500 to 1,000 times faster than the average laptop computer today — while using less energy — have been modeled and tested by researchers from the University of Cambridge, the Singapore A*STAR Data-Storage Institute, and the Singapore University of Technology and Design.
PCMs are capable of reversibly switching between two structural phases with different… read more
A new search algorithm that improves a robot’s ability to find and navigate to tagged objects in a room or house has been developed by Charlie Kemp, an associate professor in Georgia Tech’s Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, former Georgia Tech student Travis Deyle, and University of Washington Professor Matthew Reynolds,
The team has implemented their system in a PR2 robot, allowing it to… read more